It's actually quite tight now in Korea's group after they lost 1-0 to China and Syria beat Uzbekistan 1-0. Korea have a pretty big match coming up against Syria at Sangam on Mar 28th (Tuesday) which they can't really afford to lose. China breathe some life into their chances but they still have three away games in the last four including the next one away to leaders Iran. Unlike UEFA, the AFC does not use head-to-head as a tie breaker before all group matches, so China's 1-0 win does not guarantee them the tie-breaker over Korea should they end level on points.

So since I am back in the US I don't get to see the national team play often. What happened in the Iran match? Was it a turf issue or was it an incompetence issue? How bad was the turf? Everytime I went to Seoul World Cup Stadium the turf was in great shape.

trainer001 wrote:So since I am back in the US I don't get to see the national team play often. What happened in the Iran match? Was it a turf issue or was it an incompetence issue? How bad was the turf? Everytime I went to Seoul World Cup Stadium the turf was in great shape.

The pitch is not great; the grass cuts up quite easily but it was no worse than usual. There were more fans than usual but they were not particularly loud because most of them are casual fans that are not familiar with chants. Besides that is a completely unacceptable excuse. In reality they were just shit. Son was as useless as he ever is in national team shirt and the team overall was unadventurous. The substitutions were baffling. If I had one criticism of the fans it would be that they were as Koreanly positive as ever after the game despite being served up with a 90 minute snore-fest. I doubt most of them will be in a rush to come back.

Why are all the matches in Korea's group kicking off at the same time, but all at different times (up to seven and a half hours difference) in the other group?

Is it just because people in Australia can't play football in the middle of the night? Doesn't this provide an opportunity for all sorts of shenanigans? If Saudia Arabia know that a draw will suffice, or they need to win by 2 goals, then they can adopt their tactics once they've seen the Australia result.

Also, I noticed that UEFA dropped the head-to-head tiebreaker down below overall goal difference. That's a shame as I thought it was a good idea, partly because it gives less opportunity for shenanigans.

nzfooty wrote:Hi all, can someone with better geopolitical grasp explain how it is that Syria is the play-offs and Uzbekistan has (yet again) failed at this stage?

Syria were lucky to get a point in Iran, with a goal in the third minute of stoppage time and that goal made all the difference. Four of their nine goals in the third round have come in stoppage time. They've actually got a bit of a golden generation at the moment despite what is going on back home. They won their first West Asian title back in 2012. And motivating the team, in contrast to some of the Korean players, is not a problem.

Uzbekistan were not helped by picking up only one point in their last three qualifying matches. If they can't beat this Korea team at home then they have no business being at the World Cup. Six goals scored in ten group matches says a lot.

Hey eujin, all good points but do you know how it is that Syria can field a team to begin with? I have been basically insulated from the rest of the world the last two years and have snippets only to go by. According to some media outlets half of the country is in Poland, converting everyone to islam and stealing blonde women from "us".(And then you have a closer look at guys protesting and you get why they may feel that way).

Fine effort, so basically their golden genration coincided with the Civil War?

As I'm sure you know, half the country is not in Poland, not even in Europe, not even refugees. The domestic league is still running in the government controlled areas. The 2016-2017 Syrian Premier League just finished with al Jaish winning the title http://de.soccerway.com/national/syria/ ... -a/r38514/ although they've not been getting clubs "licensed" for the Champions League for a while now (which is also proving difficult in Iraq and Lebanon).

The core of the national team are playing overseas, mainly in top Arab leagues and I think some combination of the Syrian government, plus the AFC, plus interested individuals have found a way to finance the national team playing all their home qualifiers in Malaysia. There has been quite a lot of Western media coverage, including the link I posted x comments above from the Bbc, some positive about their achievement, some not so positive. That's always the way with the media.

They're definitely up against it versus the Aussies though. I think we ended up with three strong teams in one group and one strong team in the other group this time around. The media circus would be worse than North Korea if they did qualify for the World Cup, especially with it hosted in Russia.

In Yangju, if your cabbage doesn't understand you and you have valid reason for not eating it, then it is ok to go to other vegetables for your kimchi - though strictly nothing from south of Namyangju. -- Martyrs Forever